Following the publication of Darwin’s On the Origin of Species in 1859, and following the exchange between Matthew and Darwin in the pages of the Gardeners’ Chronicle in 1860, Matthew’s claim to priority, stemming from what he wrote about natural selection and evolution in On Naval Timber and Arboriculture, received some notice in periodicals of the time. This appears to have been mostly as a result of Matthew writing to the editors to complain about some previous article ascribing full priority to Darwin.

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